The 30 Second Rule of Mini Presentations

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When you have something really important to say and very limited time to say it in, remember the 30 second rule. It goes like this: “People will tend to remember your first and last 30 seconds and forget most of what’s in the middle.”

It works like this. When you start a presentation, come out with a bang for the first 30 seconds. Memorize it. Tell them what you’re going to tell them, such as, “I have a way to boost sales by 25% while dropping expenses 10%.” That’ll get their attention. You don’t want a wimpy start like, “Thanks for giving me your valuable time. I owe a lot of thanks to the people in my department. They are great people.” Yeah, yeah, yeah. Thanks and credit are good, but tuck them in later.

Then, at the end, plan the last 30 seconds to summarize your key points and include a call for action. Memorize that, too. What is it you want people to do? Do you want them to get started on the project? Do you want to start a study? Do you want people to make a commitment? Just tell ‘em what you want.

Denis Waitley wrote, “People tend to remember first what they heard last. And they tend to remember best what they heard first.” So your smart strategy for a great mini-presentation includes planning your first 30 seconds and your last 30 seconds.

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This entry was posted on Thursday, April 27th, 2006 at 9:27 am and is filed under Podcast. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

The 30 Second Rule of Mini Presentations

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